4/6 Expressions

Lucky for me, my daughter has caught the "Designer" bug by watching a design show. I love to sew, but just don't make the time to do much any of it. I have patterns that I purchased during the $1 sales. So, she found one she likes - a hoodie - and she found 2 advertising t-shirts we really don't need. She has cut the hoodie pieces out of the 2 t-shirts. Now, we need to drag the machine out to begin the sewing. We may wait until next weekend for that part. I did my grocery shopping for the week today. I hit Dollar General Market and got their bananas in a bag for $1 - looked for the largest bag. The 2 lbs of carrots for $1 and 3 more packs of the their 12 oz bacon for $1. Then to Kroger. They have extended their buy 10 of certain items and get $5 off. Of course I got other things, mostly items with coupons - I got e-mailed a link for a .50 off a 2 lt of Pepsi and was able to to print 2 - so, I got 2 of those - on sale for 4/$5. I also used up the rest of my Philly Cheese coupons for free 1/3 Fat Cream Cheese and the Thomas Bagels. I ended up spending $10.67 at Kroger and according to my receipt, I saved 76% with coupons and store savings in the amount of $28.21. I will also be sending in a rebate for $2.50 on that Kroger total. Then off to CVS. I was able to print off $2 coupons for any Excedrin at a coupon site. It allowed me to print 2. At CVS, they are on sale for $1.99 and you get $1 back in extra care bucks. They were also having a buy $10 in Febreeze products and get $5 back in ECBs and I had a $24.95 ECB for buying 5 Soft Soap Body Wash last week. Since CVS doesn't give change on the ECBS, I purchased 4 12 packs of Diet Pepsi for the Pepsi-a-holic in the family. After coupons, I spent @.14 out pocket, $1.46 was tax. Anyway, I got $7 back in ECBs and will be sending in a rebate for $6.99. Also, with all of Pepsi purchases, my husband has been diligently loading the points in at the Pepsistuff.com website. He also has enough to order a DVD set. Next, on to Publix. I got a lot of stuff there. The best deals were their - but the brand name item and get the Public brand free on several organic products. I also couldn't pass up the General Mills Brownies - they were BOGO and they had codes on them to get a free movie ticket. Actually, the max was 2 movie tickets - so, I bought 10 boxes. I went to the website to load the codes - but, it doesn't "open" until this Thursday. So, cheap entertainment for family and I will be donating brownies for any office, school, holiday functions for a while. There were also 10 cent Box Tops for Education tabs on these brownies - so, those will be donated to my daughter's school. Although the brownies are the healthiest things to eat in the world, we will enjoy a box or two ourselves. All said and done, I saved 33% at Publix using a competitor's $5/$30 coupon and some manufacturer coupons at Publix. The 1 cent mystery item here was a loaf of Publix brand bread. All of these stores are within a "loop" for me. Round trip was less than 10 miles.